Night still had several hours of life left. She stood in the doorway to the room and tried not to think of the blood.
You will wait outside the door to his room, Mister Catch, until I call you in. You won't be alone. I will be right beyond the door. You see? And I will knock my hand against it when I want you to enter. You will not say my name while we are in there. That's very important. Alright? We will be quick with this apology; the Constable assigned to his room will -- will likely only be eating his late-night dinner for an hour's time, and if the Councilor has spoken to them, they will not want you here.
Just lingering beyond the threshold, she thought she could feel the sticky, red mess on the palms of her hands, smeared down deep into her skin like a tattoo. The girl thought she could feel the stern steel of a needle clutched between the pads of thumb and forefinger, but nothing was there -- nothing, except a strip of bloody skirt-fabric that had faded more brown than red.
The attendants had thoroughly cleaned the floor in Councilor Treadwell's room of the footprints of blood. That night of stitching -- ninety-seven sutures, all counted one by one, the number was an indelible scar in her memory -- seemed like it had scarcely ever happened at all, at least according to the cleanliness of his private room. A single candle guttered at the bedside, illuminating enough to show the stark contrast of countless dark threads against his over-stretched skin. She had done that. She and Menna Janessa. He was not a peach or a little poque bag, but a person, a man whose breath still rattled in his lungs.
She thought to turn around and leave. She should have, but a conversation needed to happen. Despite her fear, she pulled that swatch of blood-stained and edge-burnt fabric down around her face like a mask--
(Noura had taught her about the importance of masks, how they helped keep the sloppy emotions inside and bolster strength)--
The girl peered out from two clumsily-torn eyeholes and spoke, trying to keep the accent -- and the fear -- out of her voice.
"Wake up," she said, quietly approaching the bed in Treadwell's room at the Rememdium. "Wake up, ser, so we might speak about things you have said. We all heard them. I heard them." Children, he'd sputtered in his bloody throes. Catch. Two simple utterances, and with it, a swath of blame and things unexplained.
Underneath her cloak, a thing she wore to broaden her shoulders and give greater girth to her frame, she shivered and sweat hot beads; this could only go so well before it would certainly go wrong, yet, she had to try to fix it, mend the pieces. Protect her friend. Her family.
"My name," the feminine figure pronounced, tugging the blood-stained wool of her old dress tight underneath her chin so the Councilor might not see any recognizable part of the girl, "is Scarlet Glass. I am ears in every wall and -- and a tongue in all the ears of those who matter.
"I think it is best that we talk."